The Teviotdale Herald

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1 The Teviotdale Herald July 2016 The Official Newsletter of CLAN KERR/CARR Of the United States and North America Suite 2, 679 Silvercreek Drive Winter Springs, Fl Official U.S. Clan Kerr Website: CLANKERR.US

2 Want to Get Involved In games and festivals in your area? WE WANT YOU!!!!!! President s Message There are hundreds of Scottish games and Celtic festivals annually across the United States, of which less than twenty to thirty have any Clan Kerr/Carr representation or participation. Volunteer and get involved. Share and support your heritage at these events. Its fun and rewarding. If you want to get involved we can help with membership forms, brochures, In the first half of 2016 Clan Kerr/Carr (Clankerrus.com) of the United States and North America has continued to expand in membership and participation at numerous highland games attended across the United States. The clan and its representatives attended seven gatherings in the first half of Membership continues to grow and is now expected to surpass three hundred by the end of As mentioned in earlier newsletters the total population of just Kerr s and Carr s in the United States today, not including its septs, exceeds several million. This total is almost half the total number of all the people now living in Scotland. Kerr s and Carr s visiting some one hundred and eighty highland games and Celtic festivals across the country each year are presently in the hundreds of thousands. Many are actively searching for information about their heritage and genealogy. Active Kerr/Carr clan participation in these games and festivals is less than thirty. Expanding clan participation at games is a slow process. Aside from our organization there is only one other Kerr Association which exists along the Virginia to South Carolina corridor. We and they are actively working to expand Clan presence at more games across the United States.

This Carr is also the only American to have flown a combat mission into wartime Czechoslovakia in a P-51 Mustang, and returned from that mission flying not his Mustang P-51, but a Folk Wolf-190: one

3 copies of newsletters, and how to get started. Contact us at A Famous Air Force Carr A new member of Clan Kerr/Carr recently informed us about Bruce Carr, a WWII fighter pilot who was a World War Two Ace with fourteen kills in Europe. But there is more. This Carr is also the only American to have flown a combat mission into wartime Czechoslovakia in a P-51 Mustang, and returned from that mission flying not his Mustang P-51, but a Folk Wolf-190: one of Germany s hottest wartime fighter planes. Carr was shot down over Czechoslovakia by flak, then made his way to a German airfield nearby and successfully stole the German fighter which he flew back to his base in France. Upon landing, his commander, Colonel George Bickell stuck his head into Bruce s cockpit and exclaimed, Carr, where in hell have you been? In the post war years after he retired Bruce continued to fly a friends Mustang, but in Bruce s words, a little more conservatively than he did in Europe. Today Bruce Carr s Mustang is on permanent display at the Paris Air Museum in France. In Bruce s retirement years he continued to fly Mustang in the United States, but in his words, a little more conservatively than he did in wartime Europe.

As a result of Congress s December 1861 decision to authorize the Medal of Honor, eight medals have been awarded, six to men with the name Carr and two with the name Kerr.

4 Kerr s and Carr s Other Decorated American A member looking around on the internet concerning noteworthy Kerr/Carr s forwarded a request that our newsletter include a commentary on Kerr/Carr recipients of America s Medal of Honor. As a result of Congress s December 1861 decision to authorize the Medal of Honor, eight medals have been awarded, six to men with the name Carr and two with the name Kerr. Of these: two received the award during the Indian Wars, four during the Civil War, one in China s Boxer Rebellion, and one in World War Two. Details on the individual Medal of Honor recipients can be accessed in the Clan History section. The Council of Scottish Clans and Associations Clan Kerr/Carr s president, has been a member of COSCA since 2012 and attended the 2016 annual COSCA council meeting which met again this year at the Chieftain s Tent at the early July Grandfather Mountain Games. The council s three fold function is to strengthen America s Scottish community by bringing clans and individuals together, to support clan membership, to provide education on clans, and build diaspora relationships with Scotland. Unlike earlier meetings, the 2016 event was poorly attended and pointed out a widening gap between the formal and informal interest in formal Scottish clan organizations in North America. Discussions highlighted the overall decline in many American clans, their ageing leadership which is too often seriously stultified and largely disconnected with today s youth, too many of whom are increasingly impatient with the formal clan leadership associated with the old world. A heated debate was held between a distinguished guest trying to restart his recently disbanded clan - with another distinguished guest chieftain who suggested the heavy recognition expenses demanded by England s Lord Lyon to restart disbanded clans was necessary and had to be endured. Observers smiled when it became apparent that the guest chieftain had himself found ways to avoid and or circumvent the same clan restart expenses demanded by the Lord Lyon had been avoided.

Future Highland Games Events of Note 6 August 2016 Monterrey, CA 20 August 2016 Buffalo, NY* 27 August 2016 Quechee, VT* 10 September 2016 Edinboro, PA* 3 September 2016 San Francisco, CA* 8

5 Future Highland Games Events of Note 6 August 2016 Monterrey, CA 20 August 2016 Buffalo, NY* 27 August 2016 Quechee, VT* 10 September 2016 Edinboro, PA* 3 September 2016 San Francisco, CA* 8 September 2016 Estes Park, CO* 17 September 2016 Lincoln, NH 23 September 2016 St. Louis, MO 24 September 2016 Dixon, CA 1 October 2016 Reno, NV 1 October 2016 Felton, CA 9 October 2016 Ventura, CA 10 October 2016 Stone Mountain, GA* 21 October 2016 Murray, KY* 19 November 2016 St Andrews Dinner, Orlando, Fl* 18 November 2016 Mount Dora, FL* 28 January 2017 Burns Night, Orlando, Fl* *Events at which Clan representatives anticipate being present. Grandfather Mountain 2016 Clan President Bob Miller and his wife Margaret Carr spent a week at Grandfather Mountain for the 2016 Highland Games. Visits were made repeatedly to the Kerr Family Association tent at the games and useful discussions held regarding expansion needs for the Kerr clan in the United States with Hellen Kerr, President of the Kerr Family Association. Hellen s association has been hosting a Kerr tent at Grandfather Mountain for many years. They asked us to carry the Kerr banner at the Sunday Kirking of the Tartans, after which Bob Miller accompanied Hellen Kerr and twelve other Kerr association members for the Sunday morning Massing of the Clans. Clan Kerr/Carr s Official Piper Steven Macdonald was recognized among the entertainment groups at this year s Grandfather Mountain games, but as an accomplished piper who is no longer competing for grade recognition these days. Steven also conducted numerous solo

6 and accompanied venues in and around the game site and to the enjoyment of significant crowds. Among his most famous presentations were those on the hillside beneath two mature oak trees near the Alex Beaton Stage. Among Steven s most popular pieces is his rendition of the theme song from Last of the Mohicans. From The Clan s Genealogist Research today for the average rank and file looking into their family backgrounds is a thousand times easier than a decade ago. We continue to receive enquiries from across the country for help, mostly from Carr/Kerr s seeking distant family members in and around their direct line who have become lost, misplaced or forgotten. Electronic data bases available today continue to simplify a once seemingly impossible problem. For instance, one researcher in upstate New York, in just one local cemetery, found twenty seven Kerr/Carr burial records: ten from the 1800 s and another seventeen from the early 1900 s. Clankerrus.com s genealogist will help members wherever possible. Information is also available at various repositories in and around the United States. For instance, My Heritage Super Search (a search engine), for contains 7 billion records, birth death and marriage records, collections of newspapers worldwide, 1.5 billion family trees, vital records from forty eight countries, and grows by some two hundred million new entries monthly. Just a few of others also available are: National Archives at College Park, Maryland Library of Congress Historical Societies at all levels DAR and SAR libraries in Washington DC Ellis Island immigrant records United States census records Cemetery records The Odom Library in Moultrie, GA The Kerr Family Association in NC Ancestor Research - Online State, county, and city government records Newspaper historical records at all levels. Robert Burns Birthday

7 All members are reminded that the celebration of Scotland s greatest bard and poet will soon be upon us. Hundreds of Saint Andrews Societies across the United States celebrate two events annually, the first each November is for Scotland s patron Saint Andrew. The second event, around 25 January, is Robert Burns birthday. Both, but especially the second event involves the pomp and circumstance always surrounding Robbie Burns birthday: celebrated at large dinners in which the address to the Haggis is made, followed by its trenching and the release of the Haggis s delightful odors amongst all in attendance. Of necessity or tradition, the trenching is always quickly then followed by the consumption of copious drams of single malt whiskey. Cheers. So you are a Kerr or Carr? Tell me about your background? American Kerrs and Carrs are largely ignorant about the origins of their name, its background, and history. Surprisingly the name is not limited only to Scotland or the British Isles. In fact it also includes the lands around the North Sea, like Denmark, Germany, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and the Brittany and Normandy areas of France, with Viking, Anglo Saxon, and Norman names like Kar, Kjar, Kjaer, Carres. In the last thousand years since the name is believed to have first come ashore with the first Anglo Saxon King invading England near Hastings in He overthrew Harald, the existing monarchy of the time, allowing the name Kerr and its derivatives to gradually permeate northward across England into southern Scotland. Over this same span of time most of the people residing across the northern reaches of Scotland were a disparate group of nameless warring tribes who only in the last five centuries have begun gathering into small groups called families or clans. And it is only in the last two hundred years that any of these families and clans have started to become known by their tartans which is a new development. So if you are a Kerr or Carr? Now you know. Miscellanea Clan Kerr/Carr of the United States was founded in 2001 and attended eight to ten highland games annually through 2011 when it was officially

8 incorporated in Florida in 2011 as a non-profit 501( c)(3) foundation. The Teviotdale Herald, is the official Clan Kerr newsletter for North America. It is published semi-annually for the benefit of its membeship. What is Kirkin o the Tartans In Fact Its a 70 year old Scottish American Custom? In 1947, Presbyterian Reverend Peter Marshall of Washington DC, who also served as chaplain for the United States Senate at the time was interested in making American Scots take more pride in their heritage, Reverend Marshall decided to hold the first religious church service to instill Scottish pride and honor in their tartans. He held the first such ceremony in Washington DC on Reformation Sunday which is the last Sunday in October. Marshall s religious celebration soon caught on elsewhere among other church denominations not only in the Washington area but then across the United States. Congress then declared April 6, 1954 as tartan day. Scots in Scotland observe they tried to get rid of the British Prince Edward Stewart in When they failed England imposed the Act of Proscription, forbidding Gaelic, Scottish dancing, playing the pipes, and cloth associated with any clan. Scots back home now allege that back then they carried hidden pieces of cloth to Church services and touched it with their hands when local priests gave benediction. However few if any tartans have ever been recorded in Scotland before the early part of the 1800 s to support their position. You decide?

The Scotsman. Kirkin' O' the Tartans April 29, st Presbyterian Church Vero Beach, FL. Scottish Society of the Treasure Coast 9 AM & 11 AM

The Scotsman. Kirkin' O' the Tartans April 29, st Presbyterian Church Vero Beach, FL. Scottish Society of the Treasure Coast 9 AM & 11 AM Scottish Society of the Treasure Coast The Scotsman V O L U M E V I I I S S U E V A P R 2 0 1 8 - M A Y 2 0 1 8 Kirkin' O' the Tartans April 29, 2018 1st Presbyterian Church Vero Beach, FL Iona Abbey &